The government that governs it today — and the one that takes over on New Year's Day

HOLDERS AS OF NOVEMBER 2026 · SUCCESSIONS OF JANUARY 1, 2027 PRINTED AS TRANSITIONS

The county, this month: the whole designated place lies in Commissioner District 1, the county's northern district, and the seat is held through December 31, 2026 by Carl H. Baxmeyer (R), president of the three-member Board of Commissioners, sitting with Rafael Morton (District 2) and Anthony Hazen (District 3). On November 3, 2026, Baxmeyer was defeated by Bill Redman (D), 16,735 votes to 11,924 — Redman, the county's term-limited sitting sheriff, takes the District 1 seat, and with it Granger's commissionership, on January 1, 2027, and the board stands 2–1 Democratic from that date. The figures are the unofficial returns; the county's results become official when its Election Board certifies them. On the nine-member County Council, Granger's Harris Township ground sits in District C, held through December 31 by Daniel J. Schaetzle, the council's president in 2025; Jan Cervelli (D) defeated the seat's earlier holder, Jamie O'Brien, 5,521 to 5,145 on November 3 and holds District C from January 1, 2027. The balance of the place's Clay Township precincts sits in District A, where Mike Hamann (D) defeated the incumbent Joe Thomas, 5,572 to 4,476, and likewise takes his seat January 1. The council as a body turns from a 5–4 Republican majority to 7–2 Democratic on that date. The countywide officers Granger answers to were all carried by the Democratic line on November 3 and all take office January 1, 2027: Prosecutor Amy Cressy, Clerk of the Circuit Court Stephanie Ball (defeating the incumbent, Amy Rolfes), Auditor Autumn Kaylor, Sheriff Scott Ruszkowski — the South Bend chief of police, succeeding the sheriff who beat the commissioner — and Assessor Victor Cummings. What the county does on this ground is the unincorporated resident's daily state: the sheriff's patrol in place of a police department, the county highway and drainage apparatus, and courts that sit in South Bend, not here.

The townships, this month: Harris Township is governed through December 31, 2026 by Trustee Kenneth E. (Ken) Lindsay, in office since January 2015 — the closest officer this place has to a mayor, and, in his Granger Gazette history series, its memory-keeper — with board members Bob Fox, Charles (Chuck) Sulok, and Karen Vargo, as the township's own site prints them. The township office stands at 13981 State Road 23, in the building that is also Clay Fire Station 24; the township administers assistance, keeps two cemeteries and two parks, and holds two of the five seats on the fire commission. In Clay Township the trustee's office stands at 18355 Auten Road, in the building that is also Station 22; the holders of the Clay trusteeship across the terms since 2010 stand unverified at first-hand strength in this build's record — the Government leg carries the gap openly, with the State Board of Accounts' examination reports named as its settler — and this chapter does not pretend otherwise. Both townships' governments entire were put to the voters on November 3, 2026 — in Harris, Lindsay against Veronica Vos for trustee, and Vargo, Fox, and Kimberly M. (Lindsay) Gorski against Jacob Baska, Sharon Brinker, and Ryan Callahan for the board; in Clay, Sean O'Brien against the caucus-placed Matthew Clayton for trustee, with six board candidates divided by party — and here the record of this month runs out: no source reached by the Government leg or by this chapter's verification sweep (the broadcast results service, the Tribune's coverage, the county's independent results journal, the national township-results aggregators) publishes the Harris and Clay township outcomes, though the journal's county figures rest on the Clerk's precinct summary report, which exists and settles them. The winners, whoever they are, take office January 1, 2027; until the Clerk's certified summary is pulled, this book prints the seats as held through December 31 and the succession as open — the first named gap of the Government leg, carried into this chapter unchanged rather than filled by inference from the county's wave.

Fire, library, and the absent counter: fire and emergency medical service are the Clay Fire Territory's, led by Chief Jaren Kilian, from five stations — two of them on Granger ground, Station 24 at 13981 State Road 23 and Station 25 at 12481 Anderson Road, the old Harris department's houses under their 2013 numbers. The territory is twelve months from its voted enlargement: on March 24, 2026 the boards of the seven units — Clay, German, Harris, and Penn townships and Osceola, Indian Village, and Roseland — approved merging the Clay and Penn territories into one, still named Clay Fire, effective in 2027; the township's own forward note records that the fire commission is reconstituted when the state approves the boundary change, and that approval's state is the merger's open item this month. The library is the Mishawaka-Penn-Harris district's Harris Branch, 51446 Elm Road — the branch named for its township, opened 2004, not for the place it serves. And the license branch prints its negative once more: no BMV seat stands inside the designated place, and none is under construction; Granger's motorists use the Mishawaka branch at 2544 Miracle Lane, with its twenty-four-hour Connect Center kiosks, as the BMV leg records.

Sources:

1. The Government leg of this build (gr-gov-county, gr-gov-harris, gr-gov-clay, gr-gov-elections-2026, gr-gov-fire, gr-gov-library), rosters as of November 11, 2026, and its sources: St. Joseph County official records; South Bend Tribune, November 9, 2026; WNDU election results, November 3, 2026; the township and territory sites read November 2026.
2. Fresh verification, November 11, 2026: South Bend Tribune election live blog, November 4, 2026 (Baxmeyer "lost to term-limited St. Joseph County Sheriff and Democrat Bill Redman"; Clerk Ball over Rolfes) and St. Joe Current's results journal (Commissioner District 1: Redman 16,735, 58.4 percent; Baxmeyer 11,924 — figures identical to this section's; its methodology note resting on the Clerk's precinct summary report, and its statement that results become official on Election Board certification); WNDU, March 24, 2026 (the seven units' merger vote, effective 2027; Chief Kilian). Township outcomes: searched again the search — WNDU results service (county races only), St. Joe Current (profiled races only), AmericanElectionHQ Harris board page (race archived, no figures) — still unpublished in every source reached; the gap stands.
3. The BMV leg of this build (bmv-modern-course): the four county seats as of November 2026; no seat inside the CDP.